Huskey: Building a plane in midair

Quote of the day, quote of the month, and quite possibly quote of the year.

Of course, this is only January, but you have to admit thatís a good quote.

And, when I put it in context for you, I think youíll agree.

Gov. Tom Corbettís budget secretary, Charles Zogby, gave us that quote last week when a group of local editors headed up to the governorís mansion for an editorial board meeting on the state pension crisis.

And crisis is the right word. Pennsylvania has dug itself an incredibly deep hole.

We can sit around and blame whoever we want, but the problem is real and itís here, and itís time it was dealt with.

Both parties have to take some blame on this one.

In 2001, under a Republican governor, a bill was passed that gave a 25 percent increase to state employee pensions. And if that wasnít bad enough, and it was, employees were not forced to increase their contributions.

Now we all know what that massive hike in pensions was about, right?

Well, take a stroll back in time and see exactly when Philadelphia and Pittsburgh started eyeballing new stadiums. Not a bad deal, huh? Unless of course youíre just a taxpayer footing the bill for it all.

And if that werenít bad enough, and it was, some school districts didnít even bother to pay into the pension plan because the stock market had been doing so well that they didnít think they needed to.

Of course, after Sept. 11, 2001, that all changed.

Still, the state pension plans, which cover municipal workers and teachers and pretty much all government employees, was still in the black in 2004.

Unfortunately, no one was working on the plane at all during that time, or for the next five years while it was going into a nose dive. By 2006 there was a $146 million short fall. In 2007 another $324 million was tacked on and it just kept getting worse. Weíre now looking at a $41 billion unfunded pension liability.

And while I said earlier that we can sit around and point fingers, as if it really wonít help matters, Iíd sure like to point a couple of fingers at the people in charge from 2005 to 2010, when it appears as if not only was no work being done on the plane, I donít even think anyone was looking at the plane.

Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell was in charge during those years.

We had him here for editorial board meetings as well, and boy could he talk up a blue streak. He was a friend of education, he boasted.

Apparently, he wasnít a friend of airplanes.

As far as I can tell not one piece of legislation was passed during those years to address the ever expanding pension deficit. Talk about kicking the can down the road.

Well, guess what folks, that can has had the you know what kicked out of it, and I believe it was even ran over by a plane a couple of times, so we just canít kick it down the road anymore.

This is a call out to all our state legislators, especially those who werenít in office during the time when all of this was going down, which accounts for about three quarters of you, to stand up and do something about it.

Consolidate the school districts. We have 501 in Pennsylvania. Thatís 501 superintendents and supporting staff. Put one superintendent in charge of every county. Thatís 67, so weíre going to save 434 $100,000-plus salaries and of course the supporting staff salaries as well.

Oh, and for the last (I know itís not going to be, and you do, too) time, can we have some real property tax reform? Take the burden off property ownersÖthis year, and stop kicking that can down the road.

Thatís exactly what Gov. Corbett and his team, including the very quotable Charles Zogby, are trying to do.

Now, put your flight suit on and climb aboard. Thereís work to be done.

Stan Huskey is the editor of The Times Herald. He can be reached at 610-272-2500 ext. 215 or at shuskey@timesherald.com. Follow @StanHuskey on Twitter.